In producing large concrete products such as box sections, round pipes, culverts or manholes, reinforcement wire mesh cages are required to provide the necessary strength to the finished product. When these cages are placed in the forms, they must be spaced from each other and also spaced from the surfaces of the form used to produce the particular concrete product.
Commonly known spacers used for double cage reinforcement wire mesh cages for rectangular concrete products, such as box sections, have an eye at each end of a straight section. The eyes serve to space each of the cages from the surfaces of the product form. The straight piece between the eyes determines the spacing between the two reinforcement cages. For use with the double cage wire mesh cages for large round concrete products, another form of a suitable spacer has an eye on one end and a J-hook on the other end, the latter being hooked to one cage while the eye is hooked over a circumferential wire of the other cage. The eye of the spacer serves to space the cage from the form. The double cage spacer is typically constructed of spring steel and has a center straight section that joins U-shaped portions which determine the distance between the cages. Extending outwardly from the U-shaped portions are loops at the outer end of which are hooks that lock the spacer onto the circumferential wires of the cages. The loops extend outwardly from each of the cages to provide the spacing of the cages from the concrete forms.
Both of these spacers can be easily installed from outside of the double cage and do not require welding or other special attachment to the cages, thus speeding up the installation process and making it less costly to the producer of the concrete products. However, a large number of these spacers are required for each concrete product, and because they are not reused, they are commonly shipped to the user in a shipping container in large quantities. Because of the configuration of the spacers, when the user tries to remove one spacer from the container, they seem to be all hooked together. This tangling has been a big problem with spacers of this type, and valuable production time is wasted in untangling the spacers. Therefore, there is a need for an improved method of storing, shipping and dispensing these spacers.